Wednesday, October 10, 2012

HB87 CREATING SIGNIFICANT LICENSING DELAYS IN GEORGIA

Another bad outcome of HB87 part of the law of unintended consequences: Now, because the state needs to check a person's identification and legal status in the United State, and they are short-staffed, thousands or even more U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents are stuck unable to renew their license on time. Over 200 professions require licensing in the state of Georgia, and they are now taking weeks or months to be renewed instead of days that it took in the past. For some nurses, one of the critical shortage occupations in the state, the wait can be as much as 3 months.
Of course, no one could prove that there were significant numbers of undocumented immigrants receiving state licenses for any occupation. Now, because of HB87, people have to show a "secure and verifiable document" to obtain the license, which many people do not have and is not even required to vote.
The Georgia Secretary of State, Brian Kemp, said his office cannot keep up with all the calls (almost 500,000 calls) due to the delays. The state licenses about 500,000 people. HB87 took an automatic process and made it much more bureaucratic, with no increase in funds or a way to go through rough patches.
Yes, people might die because a U.S. citizen nurse cannot get her license on time, what a sad state of affairs all because some hot heads in the Georgia legislature wanted to look like they were "cracking down on illegal immigration" and passed HB87.